Rove? Investigate?

I must admit to an odd palpitation of the heart when it was announced by the L.A. Times that the Office of the Special Prosecutor would begin an investigation into the machinations of Karl Rove. But after doing a bit of due diligence, it's beginning to appear as if Rove himself has engineered this move. It wouldn't be out of character. Once, in Texas when his client for statewide election appeared vulnerable, Rove bugged his own office and announced it to the press shortly before election day, allowing his candidate to squeak out a victory. Rove is entirely capable of launching a bogus investigation that originates in the Executive Branch, is conducted by a Bush appointee, and is intentioned to deflect the legitimate criticism that Rove is the White House nexus behind every issue currently under congressional investigation; the Valerie Plame leak, the Prosecutor firings, and five million "missing" e-mails.

Jason Leopold reports for Truthout.org, that Scott J. Bloch, the head of the OSC who announced the pending investigation, was formerly at the Justice Department's Task Force for Faith-based and Community Initiatives, and was promoted by Bush three years ago to his present post. What's more, Bloch himself is under internal investigation for his alleged "purging" of the agency of unlike-minded believers and complaints by his employees, ranging, according to Leopold, from "having an anti-gay bias to criticizing employees for wearing short skirts and tight pants to work." Does anyone truly believe that this "loyal Bushie" zealot is the one to investigate Rover's activities?

I have objected previously in this post that having the President's political advisor participate in national policy decisions and be privy to the country's most sensitive secrets is a threat to representative democracy. I likened it to setting up a whorehouse in the West Wing, as opposed to the ostensibly private trysts of previous Presidents. No one can move to impeach Rove because he's accountable only to the President, and after Bush's gangbanger-style loyalty he showed for Alberto Gonzales this week, the Dubya monster will never turn on Dr. Frankenstein. But there's a new sheriff in town and Rove has never suffered from such scrutiny since his plan for a permanent Republican majority came a cropper. No wonder he was so testy at Sheryl Crow and Laurie David at the White House Correspondents' Dinner, telling them, "I work for the American people." No he doesn't. Nobody voted for Karl Rove. He works for George W. Bush and the Republican Party. And why so mean to the ladies only a month after his dynamic appearance as hip-hopper M.C.Rove, at whatever that last press-politician Swinging Suarez was? More "hop" than "hip."

Speaking of the Correspondents' Dinner, I watched the proceedings on C-Span, dumbfounded. After the Steven Colbert skewering of last year, the administration made a "Beach Boys" decision and came up with the cryogenically preserved Rich Little for the alleged entertainment. I felt that he always took his name from Little Richard, but ironically, "rich little" describes the content of his act as well. When he began to sing a ditty; Sing a little song/All about the throng in Washington, I was reminded of the Chuckles the Clown episode of Mary Tyler Moore, when his motto was, Sing a little song/do a little dance/spray a little seltzer/down your pants. If the Correspondents' desire was to avoid a YouTube frenzy like last year, they succeeded. Although the video is worth watching just to see the audience gaping in shocked silence while President Jethro chuckles like he's watching a Hee-Haw re-run. It's been a long time since Rich Little dusted off the old Nixon impersonation, although he was never as good as David Frye. You could almost see President Zero mouth the words "I am not a crook," along with the botoxed comic, just in case he needs to practice it for the future.

So once again, the world paused for just a little while, so Washington reporters and Washington politicians could join together in a bacchanalia of self congratulations; evil actors and their enablers, locked in Rovian embrace while the world burns. The single ray of hope and peace at the dinner was Sanjaya Malakar. And after the Sheryl Crow-Karl Rove dust-up, and the numbing banality of the Lee Greenwood-like pandering to the shills by Rich Little, the President made a self-serving announcement "not to be funny" in deference to the Virginia Tech shootings. That never stopped him in years' past from filming a skit looking under desks and tables in the Oval Office for fictitious "weapons of mass destruction," while our soldiers were dying in Iraq looking for the real ones. To me, that was a far worse desecration of the office than Bill Clinton could ever have imagined. Rich Little was quoted as saying that the President approached him after the dinner and told him his skit was "perfect." That, in itself, is an impeachable offense.